KoreanClass101.com Blog

This past Saturday at my Korean Church we had a special event - a baby's first birthday party. In Korea, the baby's first birthday party is very important, and one of the events at the birthday party is said to even foretell the baby's future. This is called 돌잡이 (doljabi). Generally, many different things are spread out on a table, and the baby is encouraged to pick one of the things. The object that the baby picks is said to influence the baby's future. Usually on the table is money (means the baby will be rich), rice (means he won't go hungry), a pencil (means he will be scholarly), among other objects that all have a significance for his future. At this particular 돌잡이 there was a debit card instead of cash (nobody had any!... Show more

Right now Korea is having its rainy season. Although it might not be as intense as rainy seasons in some parts of the world, the rainy season in Korea can make you start hating rain to an extent (in my personal point of view, haha) - and it's called 장마 (jang ma). This post is not so much about the 장마 itself because it isn't THAT interesting. I just wanted to share a video with all of you who read the KClass Blog :) Here's a video I took on a bus from where I live (near 동대문) to 강남 (a major downtown area in Seoul) on my way to go meet a friend.  The bus goes over one of the many bridges that go over 한강 (Han River) which is about 1 km wide on average. After the bus goes over Han River and you'll recognize some signs that have some words... Show more

Mistranslation. Okay, so a little linguistics never hurt anyone. A transference error is when something gets lost in the translation (think old Jackie Chan movies). This superbly hilarious phenomenon is not exclusive to Korean-English, English-Korean but it still is pretty funny nonetheless. One of my favorites is the whole "our mom" situation. 우리 어머니 is a way of saying "that mother in this context", "our mother" or "the mother that we both know". But when you look at it, even a newbie can be thrown off by the context. "What? Our mother? Dude, that's MY mother!" Good stuff. Why do you know my mom, man? :) How exactly is she your mom, too? Why don't we have "our" everything? This is one of those things that just doesn't translate... Show more

While I was helping teach at an elementary school, I noticed the kids said 멍미 a lot. I asked the English teachers and she said she didn't know what it meant. I thought maybe I was pronouncing it wrong or something, but later one of the students I tutor said it too, he was in 6th grade and when I asked him what it meant, he said it was 'secret language' and that it meant just "what?!" . I don't exactly know what it translates to, because he used it often and sometimes I think saying "what" in some situations wouldn't quite make sense. but while I was in 서울 he high school kids used what they called "secret language" too. I think it's more like slang though. Some other words that I learned were the slang words for elementary student, middle... Show more

Hotels. Korea has got to be best place to immerse yourself in the culture. Where else can you knock on someone's door and ask to stay the night? Oh, and not get shot trying to do so? Well of course Korea has hotels. Big ones. Expensive ones, but we don't want to talk about that. Those are no fun. And overpriced. They offer a high quality product with a high quality product price that is to be expected in any major city or country. But thankfully, Korea has other options that have more character and are definitely something unique that most visitors are hard pressed to find elsewhere. Regardless of where you stay, as long as you can hold your own without blushing from Western embarrassment, you can almost always talk down the... Show more